Sunday, November 25, 2012

“You've got to do your own growing no matter how tall your
father was.” (Irish Proverb)

For a time here lately I have been finding myself in a
position to question the ideal of existence and how it applies to me.It is my belief that I am serving penance for
the arrogance I have towards some schools of philosophy.I liken myself as a thinker of great thoughts
and have, indeed, spent much time in the contemplation of varying ideas and
have read and studied quite a few.I
originated this curiosity back in the ‘70’s when a guy I was getting drunk with
asked me a question that, to me, made absolutely no sense.At the time I gave it little consideration
due to a mentality at the time that young men existed to get inebriated with
liquor, high from whatever psychedelic material came available, and laid as
much as possible.In later years, while
at university studying at the knee of a philosophy professor who I thought much
of the question came up again, and I resisted the urge to fade into flashback
city.It was the old “if a tree falls in
the forest…” gig and I still had no clue how to answer.Twenty years later, I still don’t.

I also delved into conversations of mind and body, existence
of God, and (most vexing) the existence of my own self.I learned all the terms: Ontological
Arguments, Empiricism, Epistemology, A Priori, A Posteriori, A Fortiori,
causality, Platonism, pluralism, pragmatism, rationalism, realism, relativism,
skepticism, Socratic Method, Teleological Argument, Theism, Thomism, and Anselm's
Ontological Argument.

The English language was never meant to be spoken this way.

Learning these things served, at the time, to further show
me that I probably needed to stick to things that I understand.I chose to live life in the realm of the
understood and leave the great question to others who delight in being
intensely perplexed.

I made this grand and seemingly wise decision to no
avail.I became a writer and the focus
of my life became (paraphrasing a Twelve Step slogan) the getting and using and
finding the ways and means to get more…words.

Along with this getting and using etc. came the principle of
understanding the words I use.Understanding the meaning behind the words that I string together
in order to make a cognizant piece.And
this meant that I had to learn about whether or not I exist.

I was sitting in a meeting the other day of my favorite
Twelve Step group, reading about the theory of existentialism on my smart phone
when another member sat next to me and asked me what I was reading.I told him and he scrunched up his eyes and
asked me why the F%@# I needed to learn that.Slipping into the ease and comfort of sarcasm I sat up and announced that
I was in search of evidence that I really and truly exist.

He reached over and slapped the hat off of my head.“Feel that?” he demanded.I said that I did and that it hurt.“Well there’s your answer.If you can feel you exist.”

Still sputtering in righteous indignation, I attempted to
launch into a debate and possibly an argument, such as a philosopher would,
when he held his hand in the air.“Dude
I got run off from the bridge I have been sleeping under and it is going to be
34˚ tonight.Do you seriously believe
that I can think myself out of being cold?”

Therein lays my issues.I spend time sitting in my comfortable apartment with heat, electric,
water, food, and electronic media to entertain myself while other are lucky to
even get out of the wind for a few minutes.All my great and grand thoughts seem to fade into oblivion in the face
of confronting irrefutable proof that I, as many others do, in fact,
exist.

I got the muse for this piece from a writers group I belong
to and they wanted to know what my reason to exist was where it concerns
writing.Being the ever complicated
fool, I thought the focus too narrow and decided to write one of those great
and grand pieces about how I intellectually can solve the problem of
existence.I let it ruminate and
percolate in my brain for several days.I looked things up, and cut, copied, and pasted really cool things to
put into it.I started an outline.

And then I deleted the entire batch of bovine excrement.

Looking at that guy, remembering having my head slapped, and
realizing the reality of life in the world today brought me back to my initial
issue with existentialism as well as philosophy.The crap is too hard to read, and is not
relevant in my life as I am living it today.

What is my reason to exist?Today it is to write this piece and cook some baked ziti.Tomorrow has no real plan because it does not
exist and will not exist until when, and if, I wake up tomorrow…if there is a
tomorrow.